It's been very cold but spring is in the air.

I have been quilting this since last Thursday whilst trying to make friends with my new machine. In lots of ways it is wonderful but I am having trouble with it lifting it's foot out of the work when I turn it back on again... there must be some way round this, I just haven't discovered it yet.
A short break after having the kitchen installed and loaded and I have had the kitchen, dining, sitting room painted. DH and Andy the painter weren't sure when I said I wanted the dining area red but they both love it now. It's a Farrow and Ball paint, Raddichio. I love how matt these paints are.

The 'enjoy' sign will have to be repainted and toned down, perhaps to a dark grey.
 I made a couple of cakes today, coffee and walnut and banana bread.

The sun shone and the temperature rose to a normal spring day. It felt positively tropical after the snow we've had. There is still a tiny bit left on the north side of the fence.

I went for a little walk with Frank and saw the Gloucester Old Spot pigs through the hedge, they weren't much larger than Frank.

I found a photo of this huge icicle hanging from the house in the earlier snow. I am glad I didn't know about it when I had gone to put stuff in the bins on this pathway...

A little bit of 'sploring

St Marys Lydney

Grave, St Marys Lydney

Grave, St Marys Lydney

Now the kitchen is completed we have a little more time to explore the neighbourhood, the Forest of Dean.This is St Marys church in Lydney. I have no idea of it's age as there was nothing outside to let me know. The steeple is amazingly tall for a church in a small town. Some of the graves went back to the 1700s (there were older ones but the dates could not be read).  Both of these are 18th century.

Some of the sheep in the area are not fenced in but permitted to roam in 'their' area of the Forrest.

Sheep in the Forrest of Dean

And then there is the bizarre..... This pink and white monstrosity is a dental surgery, somehow I cannot see me visiting them, lols.

Dental Surgery, Coleford

Frank had a trip up to the Kymin.

Fliss and Frank at The Kymin

 Happy Birthday Flissy! xxx

Protest Nude Quilt

Annabel Rainbow has created a series of works which are amazing. She was approached twice by magazines who wanted to write about her and her quilts but not show her work.
I decided to point out how utterly silly this position on the part of the publishers were by creating my own nude quilt. Unfortunately I am not an artist like Annabel so with apologies to Da Vinci and Vetruvius, here is my quilt made in solidarity.

Dream Kitchen

It started on 11th,January and was supposed to be completed on the 1st of February. Everything was underestimated, the time for the electricians, the fitter, the plasterer, the painter and the worktop people. It was finished on the last day of February. And then I could start on bringing up the boxes which have been stored in a container down the bottom of the hill in Monmouth since we moved here at the end of May. It has been lovely to see so many of my things not seen for so long but there has had to bee a huge downsizing of bits and bobs (this isn't finished yet). I have emptied 35 removal boxes and there are still a few left to go, sigh.
 So here are the pictures of my dream kitchen.

 From the seating area. In the background on the left you can see the dresser I commissioned last year in the dining space.

 From the door in the hall looking into the kitchen. Those two drawers below the toaster hide the bins.

 From the dining area.

 Dining area.

What it really looks like in use. I have three of these chopping boards which lip over the worktop. They are brilliant for serving as the plates don't get cold on the quartz worktops. They are also brilliant for prep work as you can just scrape all the peelings into your hands. And when the wear out? Just go back to Ikea and replace them, lols.

The lighting was very important to me. The cupboards above and below have tapes of LED lighting. These can be dimmed when we are in the dining area entertaining.One thing is wrong and I should have insisted it was put right but in the end finished is better than perfect. I had asked for these cupboards to have four or six panes of glass in them, instead they arrived with 10 silly little panes each. Far too cutesy for me. I feel the same (but not quite as strongly) about the two little doors over the extractor unit, twee beyond belief.

Drawers, lovely drawers. The cutlery drawer dividers were made by the kitchen company.and work exceedingly well. The spice/herb solution is from Ikea. I had to get a hacksaw to cut them down to fit. They are also excellent.

 Knives and blades, another Ikea solution. Never feel you have to go completely down the bespoke route when the solution is out there for just a few £s.

This fitting for the crockery is bespoke and had to be because the drawer is a non standard size. If you think your china would be smashed to smithereens in this arrangement, rest assured, it does not move.

Every cupboard below the worktop with the exception of the sink and the corner cupboards are drawers. This helps me so much with my fibromyalgia. Anything which cuts down on the pain is good.

My mixer garage (DH calls it the Kenwood docking station). All I have to do is slide it out to use it. It even has its own dedicated socket in there. (had you noticed how many double sockets I have? Great isn't it?)

Something I have never had before, a warming drawer. I can fit 8 plates, 4 vegetable serving dishes and a gravy boat in there. Love it.

Even my fridge is a drawer with pull out shelves (I have extra fridge space with an American Fridge/freezer in the utility room).
 

I haven't needed a garbage disposer since I lived in London in the 70s and the sun shone on the cupboard where the rubbish bins were. This new one seems more powerful than I remember, but that could be my memory. I do remember it eating silver teaspoons. It will be so good come the summer not to worry about flies round the food bin.

I was going to blow a lot of money on German ovens because they were the only ones I could find which had a 5 year onsite warranty in white with a microwave combination oven matching the main oven. Then I saw these in Ikea. Less than half the price, made by Whirlpool and with a 5 year onsite warranty with Whirlpool not Ikea (that would have worried me). In my last kitchen I had a LaCanche range cooker with industrial strength heat production. Sadly my Fibro meant it was painful to use so these split level ones work for me.

I am also impressed with the induction Hobb (not Ikea unfortunately, they don't do any that are not black). In the early days it was hard to get one which would either go down very low or very high. It is as fast as gas (which we don't have in the village). This one works very well.

Even the dishwasher is from Ikea/Whirlpool. It's brilliant, it detects not only how much is in the dishwasher but also how dirty it is. AND brilliantly it has a little red light which shines on the floor in front of the machine so you can see it is running. And when it has finished, a little green light shows.

I hope you enjoyed seeing what has been going on these last few weeks. I have hopes it means I can get back to quilting now it is done. I am having so much joy cooking real food again in a kitchen which functions.

Things happening slowly (and a little quilting)

The kitchen should have been finished by now but the major delay is the arrival of the worktops and the painter is a few days late as the fitter ran over schedule. I actually had Thursday and Friday with no workmen in sight. Bliss. I veer between wanting it finished and wanting the house to myself.
So here it is without any paint. The ovens cannot go in until the cupboard is painted so the sitting room has the two ovens and the warming drawer stacked in it. They have made me some temporary worktops which I slapped a coat of paint on just so the particle board doesn't blow (that's a technical term referring to it expanding if it gets wet).  If you are bored to smithereens by the tale of my kitchen, just wait until we get to the 'watching paint dry ' phase, . You cannot be more bored than I. I so want this all done and dusted, the stuff bought up from storage and to stop feeling like we are camping.

 And to make matters worse I am in bed with a cold. I do realise I am being a total wimp going to bed with just a cold but add a cold to the fibromyalgia and it seems the best option.

They are very well made. All the wood which will be painted is pine and the rest is solid oak. The joints are beautifully dovetailed, even those at the back of the drawers which are never seen.

I have been doing a little quilting and I want to show you how effective it can be to use a bobbin thread. This one is Invisafil from Wondafil, for me it behaves better than Bottomline, it might even be the same stuff but wound onto mini cones rather than tightly onto a spool. It is even happy being used on the top of a quilt through the needle. And when you use it, the stitches themselves disappear and the back takes on an embossed look.

My new machine has arrived! Yay. I didn't want to finish this small quilt on a different machine so the new beast sat on the floor in its box for a few days. I was ready to go when this bl**dy cold hit with a vengence. My brain is not working and I couldn't even work out how to get the bobbin out of its case. It's day will come....